Sweet MUMories Oral History Project - Jim Kraft

Sweet MUMories Oral History Project - Jim Kraft

May 3, 2017

33:20

Sweet MUMories Oral History Project
Transcript: Jim Kraft, May 3, 2017
Donation record # Kraft.J.503200017.1
Transcribed by Erika Nesbit 6/01/2017.
Approved for deposit by Marsha R. Robinson 1/09/2020

MRR My name is Marsha Robinson and we are recording an oral history with Mr. Jim Kraft as part of the Sweet MUMories Oral History Project. This project marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Miami University Middletown, Ohio, campus. This interview is taking place on May 3, 2017, at the Gardner-Harvey Library. Mr. Kraft, do I have your consent to proceed with this interview?

JK Yes, you do.

MRR So how long have you lived in Middletown?

JK Since the day I was born, except for the two years when I was transferred to the Armco’s executive office in New Jersey.

MRR And did you graduate from Middletown High School?

JK I certainly did. Middletown High School, yes.

MRR What did you do after graduation?

JK Well, nothing for several years. Then I got married and as soon as I got married I started night school at the University of Dayton. This would have been about 1956. And I got my undergraduate degree there, associate degree I mean, and then went on got a bachelor’s degree and from then I went down to Xavier University in Cincinnati and got my master’s in business administration from there. And had this campus been here at that time when I started I probably would have gone there and ended up getting that degree from Miami of Ohio instead. But it wasn’t here then. But the fact that it was here later on was I think really helpful to the community and the people, at least parents, and the cost would have been a lot less. Travel time would have been a lot less and been more convenient. And I think this satisfied, you know, a need that Middletown had because we had a lot to respect for Miami of Ohio. I guess they still do but I’ve been retired. I retired from Armco before AK in 1990 when I was fifty-five years old. And then after that I started the next day working for Fifth Third Bank. I was there five years and I retired from there as the Vice President and that was in 1995. But what I did at Fifth Third was selling what I used to buy which was banking services and so on and from, you know, from the bank I was selling for. Because Fifth Third had a program and they were trying to call on corporate offices of businesses that was in the Fifth Third Banking area. And I knew all these, well they knew my name because I had been on the Cincinnati Cash Management Board. We started that and that was part of National Corporate Cash Management Board. I was on that. Was named Treasury Management Association during my tenure. So a lot of the folks recognized my name and I could get into the corporate offices with the Fifth Third Calling Office. So that’s basically what I did. Really wasn’t much of a job but it was a lot of fun.

MRR You know, I hear there was a lot of fun in this town when people went to work, when they left work, that the company was really part of the community to make sure that there was a good sense of community in Middletown. Can you tell us what that was like to watch as a child and then to see that as an employee?

JK You know, yeah as a child, you know thinking about it, I came, we came out here to Bunny Hollow to, you know Armco Park then. That True Steel book has a lot of stuff in it that you can read and in fact I even had the pages marked. But anyway, what I enjoyed in this town because I played a little bit of softball, stuff like that and I saw Bill Daum’s picture in that ribbon cutting ceremony in that book and I played against him, not knot-hole but softball was fast pitch in those days. But the company was very, it never stood in the way of letting their employees work in the community and be on committees. And that expanded to church and school, too, activities. Because I was involved, you know with some of that too. But let me tell you another side of that. That was a two way street because Armco, even though they saw, they saw that by helping the community, it was helping those employees too earn managerial experience that, you know, that helped them in their career later on, you know, at Armco. And that’s why that would benefit Armco because it was a two way street, is what I’m trying to say, and I don’t think a lot of people realize that. But...

MRR So what kind of projects would Armco employees be involved in?

JK Almost anything that was needed. I can tell you the stuff I was involved in. Mine was mostly in the Catholic community. As a matter of fact I’ve worked about fifty some years on the Family Festival. I used to run all their finances and so but, you know like I said there was a lot of things. Well, Dohan there his picture’s in a book. He was involved there.

MRR Which church was the Family Festival with?

JK The Fenwick Festival was Fenwick High School, you know that was a consolidation of three parishes. There was St. Johns, Holy Trinity and St. Mary and incidentally St. Mary’s is now the Community Center over there, the senior citizens center and there was an old gravel road off Central Avenue that went up right past that property on to what is now the Arboretum but used to be a Fresh Air camp. And I did go there as a kid, as a six year old. I spent a summer there in that Fresh Air camp. It was for if you’re underweight or whatever and, you know it helped. It was very good experience.

MRR OK. Do you remember when people started talking about building a university in Middletown? What was it like at work? What did people say?

JK Well, I think encouraged it because, you know initially you didn’t have all the courses here. We had to go to Oxford to get like your finance and all that kind of stuff. A lot of the liberal arts stuff was here I guess initially. But you couldn’t graduate from here either, you had to graduate from Miami, if I’m remembering that right. But that’s basically what it was all about. And I wanted to tell you something. Part of my career at Armco we had to, used to recruit individuals to come to work for us. We had our Human Resource department line up, this is for finance now, line up times and so on and candidates. And they would go to the university and let the university supply the candidates for us. And so we had a committee that worked on all of this to get people who were candidates who we wanted to offer jobs to. And Miami of Ohio was one of them. We had real good success in the people we had hired, you know, from there. But I mean for example, the committee -- we had people that went to the university that talked half hour interview to the students and there was somebody that was assigned if the student had been comfortable, not just from Middletown but wherever we went, they would come in the night before, spend time with that candidate, and then they would have dinner with them, breakfast the next morning, three interviews with them. And then at the end of the week everybody that was involved with those candidates decided which ones they wanted to hire. And we had a lot that we really used from Miami of Ohio. It was a very interesting process. When you asked a student from three different individuals, three different interviews, you ask them a question these questions were designed to have the same answer, even though the questions sounded different. It was thought of. And if that student came up with a different answer in one of the three interviews, we knew there was something going on there that they really didn’t understand and sort of eliminated themselves from. but that was the extent that we got into this so.

MRR Ok.

JK We had but, you know but we were really glad to see MUM getting started here because, you know that meant Oxford, the parents, you know I had some kids that went to MUM, couple grandkids that graduated from Miami of Ohio. In fact, one of them graduated this past year so, one of my grandkids so.

MRR So how many children again graduated from here?

JK I had two grandchildren that had graduated from Miami of Ohio. We had seven children. My wife raised them because I went to night school. And I had three in diapers at one time. You don’t want to put that in there.

MRR We can back up. We do have stories from women talking about having children and going back to school but we don’t have many stories about men going to school at night and…

JK Really?

MRR I would like to know more. What did it mean that you spent your time in class instead of being with your friends after work? What were the pressures of being a father and going to school? Would you mind telling us about that so maybe that’s inspiring some of our current fathers who are in school?

JK Well, when I was going to night school, my kids, we have seven, four boys, three girls, my wife literally raised them. I wasn’t there that much. You imagine going to night school and then and spending that time riding to Dayton. It would have been a lot more convenient to go here in Middletown. And that’s why I thought this campus was really going to be a great addition and then of course Armco donated it. We really had no use for this. But there was a story one time that Armco bought this land for future mill site but that was not true. It ended up going at the end of Crawford Street, you know out there where they really built the plant. But this was not really bought for that purpose but I did walk these things, these trails and so on when I was young and of course being involved with Wildwood Golf Course all those years. We belonged there for about fifty some years. Still belong.

MRR Can you tell us about the discussion at Wildwood to give some land to the university?

JK I know that Wildwood was part of this land, the five hundred some acres that [George-editor’s note] Verity had purchased and then got Armco’s board to buy but that’s all in that book there.

MRR Ok.

JK Yeah so.

MRR Ok. When I look at the committee work, I see that Evelyn Day got everything started but then the men took over and Evelyn’s name dropped out of the newspaper. Was that because she’s female?

JK I knew Evelynn very well when we she worked at Armco and she was very, very competent, very smart individual and I will say if she had been a male, probably would’ve went farther than just being a secretary.

MRR Thank you. I heard she was involved in many organizations in town and so thank you for sharing that memory of Evelyn Day…

JK I will say one more thing about her she was very involved with the Armco Girls, too.

MRR I understand that Armco Girls was very important to many of the women who worked at Armco. Can you tell us about what Armco Girls meant to the people at the factory?

JK Well, you’re using the word factory but you got to remember Armco’s corporate headquarters was here in Middletown, too, and there was probably maybe forty percent of the people that worked for Armco in the City of Middletown probably worked on Curtis Street as opposed to Middletown Works. So the Armco Girls was really a part of all of that, so there was moreso as time went on because, you know I guess in the earlier days, the women stayed at home, you know and gradually as time evolved and, actually the economy had a lot to do with this, you had to have two incomes to have a decent living, so they became members of the work force and the Armco Girls was a good outlet for those individuals and also I think some of the men that had wives, you know would associate with some of the activities the Armco Girls had so it was involved in more than the whole community rather than just, you know just the Armco side of it.

MRR And where were the men when the ladies were at the Holiday House?

JK Well, they were, if they were athletic they were playing softball, which I was involved with. They were playing basketball. They were playing golf which most of us belonged to Wildwood. Some of us belonged to Brown’s Run, out you know, out west of town here. And also Armco Park had a, you know par three golf course on it. I go back when Armco Park was organized back in 1950 something, I kept the books for that park. It was part of my job for the first thirteen years and ironically when it was sold to Warren County there was about four entities that bought that. Otterbein and Warren County were two of and then there were two other entities and my brother managed Armco Park, my younger brother managed Armco Park for the last thirteen years of the history of the park. So I was involved in the beginning of it and he was involved in the end of it so, which I thought was sort of interesting.

MRR Now, are we talking about the park at Bunny Hollow or are we talking about the other location?

JK I’m talking about the park that set out there on 741. Yeah, that Armco, that’s where the par three was out there.

MRR Can you tell us about managing the properties like Armco Park and Bunny Hollow? Were there any people that come to mind?

JK Yes, the guy that was primarily responsible for that was an individual named Walter Fall. Also but Walter Fall reported to the treasurer of Armco, which really was the same department I was in so we would have our department outings and some and I got to know Walter pretty well in that. Same as the guy that was, the individual that was manager of our park out on Route 741 so he also reported to the Armco’s treasurer.

MRR So the land came to the treasurer, the management of all of the land came through the office of the treasurer for organization purposes?

JK All of that was not steel-making facilities that did not have steel-making facilities on them.

MRR We have stories of people working at the Armco headquarters. We have stories of Evelyn Day, Mr. Verity, Mr. Hook, do you have stories of people working there that you’d like to share with us?

JK Maybe share my own?

MRR Sure.

JK My own story there because I started Middletown Works in 1952, graduated high school in ’52 and I guess nepotism got my job because my uncle was one of Armco’s first traveling salesman and my dad worked there forever and I had a brother that worked there and two brothers actually worked there and some other members of my family. So you might say we are sort of an Armco family. But I went over to, as soon as I got my associate degree from the University of Dayton, they transferred me over to the Corporate Accounting office at Curtis Street. And I was in there for about six months and then transferred down to Corporate Treasury. Actually it was the Cashiers office because I managed Armco’s cash flow directly and a few years the younger fellow that worked for me managed it for almost twenty-eight years. And we’re talking about, well if you’ve got a five billion dollar sales, if you divide that by two hundred and fifty work days that comes up to almost twenty million a day that we were working with. And I had a hundred million dollars floating in the Federal Reserve System at that time. So, if you, a couple years back in the eighties where, you know interest rates got up to eighteen, nineteen percent, if you multiply it times a hundred million you’re talking about eighteen, nineteen million dollars of income that went right to the bottom line. But that went back to the divisions. It wasn’t Corporate’s.

MRR Ok.

JK But Armco corporate, I mean Treasury, I mean you know which Walter Fall and the rest of us referred to, we had a thing called the “T-men” which was an organization which stands for Treasury. You know we had a pin and Walter was part of that and that’s where I really got to know him. Because like I was saying he’d report to the Treasury like we did. And we’d have our golf outings and our other outings and so on that was outside of the fact. Now, I’m bringing this mainly because this kind of you asked what did the men do when the women were involved in Armco Girls. This was something, you know, we had in our department that we were involved in. Of course, women weren’t involved in that. So I think a man would look, I know I did, would look into if there was something for ladies to do, it was great. And Armco was well-minded, family orientated and I think helped in that respect no matter what sex you were so.

MRR I get that feeling. But I’m also amazed at your career. So, you started off working at, in the Works. One degree took you into the corporate office. Did that happen for many people because of the university being opened?

JK No this was before the university was opened.

MRR OK.

JK But I think some people, you know probably followed that path. But the way I looked at it is I missed out at home, you know, in a lot of things, But the way I look at it, you know if I went to school where would I end up, I would know where I end up because I ended up there. But if I wanted to go and never went, I would never know. So that was the attitude I had. I thought I’d pursue that. And I think my family probably suffered a little bit for that because wife made a lot of decisions. I know I created a very independent woman, still is as a matter of fact. I’m number two.

MRR That happens a lot in Middletown from what I’ve seen. This was a company town but there were also other companies, the paper mill companies, the tobacco companies. Did you see many employees where their children of those companies would come to the Middletown campus once it opened?

JK Oh yes. Yes, I saw this was very good, In fact I wish the campus was here when I started because of the travel time, the cost, you know would have been a lot more convenient. I could have spent more time with my family because the travel time was less and I think the campus had a very, very important role in family life, not just Armco people but the whole town really.

MRR I understand that this campus serves the community by having a place where you could have cultural events or hear a speaker. Did your family participate in any of these events?

JK Over the years, yes, we did participate. And I will say this is the third of May 2017. There was a dance recital here two days ago and I was here. I had a great granddaughter participating in that so yes. You know and I had a couple grandchildren that graduated from Miami of Ohio and so yes, you know we’ve been involved with. Like I said I just wished it came earlier. I would be younger now or the campus would be older, one or the other so we would have been more involved with it.

MRR So, did MUM help Middletown families because the kids could stay here to go to school. Did it help families stay together?

JK Oh, I think so. It helped families like I said it helped the whole community. I don’t know if it was in this interview or not but I mentioned, you know it was a two way street Armco got to develop his own people. Did I mention that in this interview?

MRR Just a little but I want to know more about this two way street.

JK Well, I saw it that way and I think others did. But Armco by letting his folks and giving them time off to participate in city activities, say Middletown activities, maybe church activities, maybe school activities, school board those kinds of things, that was really a management experience that Armco employees were getting, which would help them back in their job at Armco. And Armco looked at it that way as a sharing thing. So it worked out well over the years.

MRR Do you remember seeing any of the building being built here?

JK Off and on yes because like I said I belonged to Wildwood for fifty some years and then. The only time I did not live in Middletown was those several years that I spent at Armco’s executive offices in New Jersey. Morristown and Parsippany, New Jersey. I was out there several years. So all the rest of my career was here in Middletown.

MRR Ok.

JK And I can, do you want me to get into AK Steel and how that came to be? I can tell you how that happened.

MRR Yes, let’s go to the 1980s. Let’s talk about the economy of the 1980s and what happened here.

JK Well, in the 1980s United States lost most of its steel industry. Armco was in bed with a company called Republic Steel. They were headquartered up in the Cleveland area. We were in bed at Reserve Mining in the Mesabi Range. We were one of the first companies out there. Armco and Republic started that. We mined their taconite up there. But Bethlehem Steel, Inland Steel and Republic Steel, the ones I just mentioned, all went bankrupt. National Steel. Armco and US Steel did not go. They had two things in common; Armco had a sub serial called a National Supply, which was the largest, one of the largest manufacturers of oil well and oil fuel drilling equipment in the world. US Steel had a company called National Oil Well. Those two were merged, you know. That helped because US Steel was more diversified than we were so it was a little easier for them to survive than it was for us. But the thing that really, really helped us was a company called Kawasaki Steel in Japan. Kawasaki bought half of Middletown Works and half of Ashland Works and of course we realized money from that. We operated that as a partnership for a while. Then that was a, that was taken public and the name Kawasaki and Armco, A was first, K was second, became AK Steel and that stock was sold on the market. Kawasaki got their share of that stock and I guess went back to Japan. We got our share of that stock and dumped it into pension funds and our pension funds were under-funded at that time according to actuarial tables. So anyway that got those in good shape. AK went their way, Armco went their way and we operated. Now, if you think back, Armco could really have not had two or Middletown or anywhere, we could not have been two major steel companies sitting side by side on Curtis Street. So Armco had to vacate Middletown to set up, you know, so they could make decisions better there because, you know they were cutting back. And, you know wives may be playing cards together. One wife may have been a wife of a guy that made a decision to close something down. The other wife’s husband worked…and they just couldn’t make the decisions. They had to get out. But New Jersey was chosen. I really don’t know why but it was near the financial markets near our banks and so on which were very important in the things we were doing so that’s probably why we went to New Jersey. But anyway, AK went their way. Armco went there way after AK was created. We still had Baltimore, Butler and other facilities so anyway.

MRR Can I just ask you a question?

JK Sure.

MRR Because I’m new to this area. So, there was the Armco Steel, the American Rolling Steel Company…

JK American Rolling Mill is what it started out as.

MRR Rolling Mill. And then in the 1980s Kawasaki came in and so there was a partnership between Armco and Kawasaki called AK Steel.

JK No, no it was called a limited [partnership-editor’s note]. Armco, it was a, it wasn’t called AK Steel at that time. AK Steel didn’t come into existence until the stock was sold. That company was created and then stock sold in that company so we exchanged on the exchange. Now, Armco was still in existence at that time.

MRR That’s what I mean there.

JK Both steel companies were involved, were operating but AK like I said went their way, Armco went their way and then I knew some fellas that were involved in a due diligence that was going on. I wasn’t part of that but I know about it. That on the AK side that said, you know, we do not want to merge with Armco because Armco had all this legacy cost which happened to be the, you know, the retiree benefits because we kept that. We had about thirty-five thousand, I think that could be wrong or close to that, retirees at that time were playing the benefits out of our defined benefit plan. These were our Middletown Works and National Works employees but we kept all that along with all the rest of Armco employees. So we had that because Armco had this drag on them or responsibility on them. AK didn’t. They were born without that because we took all that. But then they went on and invested a billion dollars in a plant at Rockport and that was their major plant there. But anyway, these fellas that I knew were doing the due diligence on the AK side said “You don’t want to merge with Armco” because they had all this drag on them, you know so. But anyway it happened and I don’t know this for a fact but because being at the headquarters I wasn’t involved with any of that but I’m not going to tell you the guy’s name who was the mastermind of all this but anyway I knew him very well. And the merger happened and they were all back together again. AK was probably the more viable of the two at the time because we did have all this drag so they took the name of AK Steel instead of Armco Steel but it was the same thing. It was all back together, that was formerly Armco and created by Armco. And so that’s how AK became.

MRR Thank you. That makes sense. What have you seen in Middletown that is a product of Miami University Middletown? How has this campus made an impact on the city?

JK Well, I think the fact, you know, that it was here. We talked about this a while ago, I mean, you know it was here for kids or the parents of the students here that were local, you know didn’t really, it had to be less expensive you know for them. Great liberal arts school and then but yet you could get the technical side of it at Oxford. And we knew, like I said before, we had experienced the kind of graduates that Miami provided and we did hire some of those.

MRR So, is there anything else you want to add to this interview about the Middletown campus?

JK Well, I think it’s, if not the best, one of the best assets in the City of Middletown as far as, well to put the city on the map. You know there are a lot of negatives. Now, Middletown’s not the all-American city according to what people look at that it was way back but I think it probably would have gone downhill a little farther if it wasn’t for the campus. The campus was a very, very good asset for, you know for the city and well, that’s just my opinion.

Marsha Robinson

Jim Kraft

Gardner-Harvey Library, Miami University Middletown